It has been 10 years since the release of Fallout 2 and Bethesda has taken it upon itself to create the next iteration in the series. For many die-hard fans, their initial opinion of the takeover was one of disappointment, but has Bethesda truly stuck to Fallout’s roots and given fans the title that they have pining for since 1998?

You are now leaving Vault 101 

For those of you not familiar with the story, Fallout 3 begins with our protagonist finding out that his father has left the vault and entered the wastelands. You must escape from the vault and enter a world rife with mutants, ghouls and freakish humans. Of course, surviving the post apocalyptic wastelands is no easy task and you must tread carefully. Thankfully, you are provided with the Pipboy-3000a upon leaving the vault. 

The Pipboy 3000 is your digital sidekick as you traverse the wasted landscapes. It is through this wrist-mounted device that you access notes, quest details, inventory and maps. The interface is extremely easy to navigate and provides an intuitive way of incorporating the traditional menus found in most RPGs.

Fallout 3 is, at its heart, an excellent sequel in the Fallout series. The story line doesn’t exactly pick up where the previous games left off, but this helps new players easily move into the game. Yet, fans of the series will find themselves comfortable navigating what can only be called a traditional Fallout storyline. 

The quests in Fallout 3 stray from the typical search and kill sort and actually provide a level of originality that many players may find refreshing. There are some missions that have you kill animals, but there are others that have you do everything from disarming an atom bomb in the middle of a town to getting yourself injured for a survival book. These quests help contribute to the breaking of what has become a source of mediocrity in many RPG titles. 

The most toted feature of Fallout 3 is the VATS system. The VATS system allows players to pause time and target individual parts of a creature’s body. Each body part is given a percentage which indicates the likelihood that you are going to hit that specific part. Of course, these percentages increase or decrease based on how far away the player is, the player’s skill with that particular type of weapon and the condition of the weapon they are using. Essentially, players are given the option of taking a real-time shooter and turning it into the all too familiar turn-based style of gameplay used in the previous titles if only for a short period of time.

To supplement the combat in Fallout 3, Bethesda has included numerous weapons for players to choose from. Players can dispatch creatures with everything from a baseball bat to the oh-so-wonderful sniper rifle. Each weapon also requires specific ammunition that is scattered throughout the world. Just remember to repair your weapons. No matter what weapon you choose, you are guaranteed to have a blast tearing through enemies and maiming their headless corpses. 

Just like any other game, Fallout 3 is not without its issues. The most noticeable issues are with the AI and their dumb to sharpshooter swing. There were moments that the enemies would have trouble shooting me from abandoned houses or through windows, while other times they would start attacking me from what seemed to be clear across the visible area. Despite this, these moments were rare and few in between and did not deter from the overall fun of the game. 

Jaw-dropping 

The only way to describe Fallout 3’s graphics is “jaw-dropping.” There are moments where you will find yourself completely infatuated with the terrain, detailed buildings and creatures. Seeing the Potomac Bridge in ruins or walking through Georgetown was a treat and was created in, what appears to be, painstaking detail. Every graphical element in Fallout 3 helps create the feeling that you are actually in a post-apocalyptic Washington D.C. and you must be weary of what lurks in the dark corners of the wastelands.

Snap Your Fingers and Wish for Simplicity 

The sound in Fallout 3 further helps to push forward the idea that you are indeed in the idealized 1950s version of the future. The radio stations that you encounter in the game play classic music and make you yearn for a simpler period of the two parent, two child Leave it to Beaver household. The purpose of sound is to further immerse a player and Bethesda has pulled this off to a degree. 

One of my only complains about the sound in Fallout 3 involves some of the dialogue, more specifically the children. There were moments when playing Fallout 3 that I wished that some sort of magic portal could form on my monitor so that I would be able to punch some of the in-game children. Their dialogue comes off horribly robotic and would agitate me to the point of clicking through the dialogue tree so they would stop talking. 

PlasmaFactor 

Many games today lack significant replayability. Fallout 3 gives players a large game world that rewards exploration and finding alternative methods of completing quests. The best example, as many of you may already know, is the bomb that sits at the center of Megaton. Not only can you decide whether or not to fix it, you can actually make the bomb explode and take out an entire town. Of course, this is just one example of many that players will find throughout the game. 

Conclusion 

Fallout 3 has a lot to offer gamers. There is no shortage of places to see and people to kill that will be sure to occupy the most obsessive of gamers for countless hours. Those of you who are more prone to picking out the negative may find the AI frustrating at times, but don’t let that deter you. Added to the mix is the addition of amazing graphics that further pull you into the whole experience. In proper style, the sounds of Fallout 3 bring you even further into the experience of playing and the only hiccup can be the occasional bad dialogue. Fallout 3 is a must purchase for fans of RPGs, FPSs and the games of old. Bethesda has done it again and there is no doubt that Fallout 3 will add dozens to the Fallout following.